A presenter from United States-based Avery Dennison will be on hand to discuss how labels lend color, branding, bar code tracking and legally required information to packaging. However, even in packaging recycling processes, “much of the time, the label is removed, and discarded as waste.”

Avery Dennison indicates it has earmarked label waste as a top strategic challenge in its 2025 sustainability goals, and at the Labelexpo 2018 event in suburban Chicago, the company’s corporate display used panels made from 50 percent consumer label scrap.

On a daily basis, more people are impacted by trash and dirty water than by climate change. This is not to say that one problem is bigger than the other, but plastic pollution is one of the more complicated issues to solve as it is so widely dispersed.

Dirty water from trash impacts drinking water, hygiene, disease, tourism, and air pollution from open-pit burning of trash. It also impacts fishing, agriculture, maritime transport, and ecosystems on land and water, and the carrying of toxicity in broken-up micro plastic, which has entered the human food chain.

The recovery and circulation of plastic waste, however, also poses some large opportunities for the engaged leaders in business, innovation and policy that see this blight in our environment and waters continuing to grow. Those who lead in the use of bring-back programs, “enlightened procurement” for recycled content, and optimization of reverse supply-chains and home “recovery/collection” programs to complement deliveries, will be well suited to inspire, recruit and engage communities who now recognize unsustainability, but who may not know how to act on it efficiently themselves.

Waste-to-energy is not a new concept, yet despite successful operations globally, it is often not on the radar of many governments as an option. This is unfortunate, as the opportunity exists to both effectively remove plastic pollution, while simultaneously supporting some of the local energy needs in the wake of the decommissioning of coal-fired generators. It can also simply help to fill the increased demand of a growing consumer population, and can even be made into road-ready fuel by smart technology like that of Australia’s Integrated Green Energy Solutions Ltd.

Global plastic waste resources which are being exported for recycling are now under threat from China’s new “National Sword” policy which is disrupting the region’s plastic scrap marketplace. Rather than creating doom, this change in circumstances offers new opportunities for both existing recyclers and new businesses which can mobilize domestic innovation, job creation and plastic resource recycling domestically in the countries where the waste is generated.

Brand owners and major retailers are responding to consumer demands and increasingly stepping up to “do the right thing” environmentally as they publicly commit to sustainable food packaging. These initiatives are designed to reduce packaging waste and encourage a shift to the circular economy.

The goal of the circular economy – currently a better-known concept in Europe than in North America – is to move from our traditional take-make-dispose economy, to one that has a closed loop, where materials, nutrients and data are continuously repurposed. One impact of such a concept is that it encourages greater use of biopolymers and recycled content in all appropriate types of packaging, including in food and beverage packaging.

Plastic is among the most common types of pollution on Earth and is rapidly making its way into the oceans. Research published in the journal Science estimated that at least 5.3 million tons of plastic debris entered the world’s oceans in 2010.

On Friday, several environmentalists, financial experts and companies that manufacture and use plastic will meet in Dallas to work on tackling plastic pollution and potentially slow that flow.

Whether or not the ocean and our waters upstream are drivers for needed improvements in plastic pollution reduction, the health of our communities, and the customers we all need, should be incentive enough to demand and encourage management to really focus on being an active participant in the circular economy. Plastic pollution is now on the top of many environmental agendas, as it directly impacts the abilities of cities to be resilient, and “smart.” Governments can facilitate circularity and waste avoidance, but it is the private sector which will thrive on it once some good case studies are promoted, scaled and replicated.